Jun 21, 2011
Is it truly possible for someone to “kill” his conscience — that is, to make it completely inoperable so that he has no moral discernment at all?
When we read about wicked crimes committed in cold blood, we wonder if the criminal is without conscience. Sometimes that seems to be the case. It is possible, through a willful life of sin, to dull the conscience and weaken it, perhaps even to the point of rendering it ineffective. In such case, moral theologians speak more of a “deformed conscience” rather than a “dead conscience.”
Conscience is the “proximate norm of morality” and we have a duty to follow our conscience. However, conscience is not infallible, and we must form it continually, through the frequent examination of conscience and sacrament of confession, the meditative pondering of the Sacred Scriptures, and the assiduous study of the moral teachings of the Church.
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